Sensory
by Rowan and Sakura
Summary: I am a soul in a suit of armor. Pointing out the obvious, I know. As such, I live through my sixth sense now, having lost the others. But the point, back to the point: Brother reads a lot of books.


Disclaimer: If Rowan owned FMA, people would summarize it as "Much like Yuki-sensei's _Angel Sanctuary_, only in a European setting and with alchemy instead of angels." Are Angel Sanctuary and FullMetal Alchemist in the same genre yet? No?...Damn.

AN: I want this to be interpreted in many different ways, so if you can, then I did my job.

Warning: Spoilers for most of the show. "Takes place" around Episode 43 or 44.

**Sensory**

Brother reads a lot. I know, an obvious observation, but true nonetheless. I cannot help sometimes pointing out the obvious, because all I can do is observe everything.

It's strange. I am a soul bound to a suit of armor- yes, pointing out the obvious again. Before all this happened, I had never considered what exactly a "soul" was. I think I was too young, then, to contemplate the concept of a human soul. All I knew was that everyone has one. Even after this happened, after I lost my body and all that was left of me was my soul, I did not really consider what a soul is. I think it's only been recently that I've found myself thinking about such things, about what exactly a soul is.

You see, I am no longer _just_ a soul. I am now the Philosopher's Stone too. It's strange. I don't feel different...well, in the sense of the word "feel", I do not think myself changed. I know I am, because of the way Brother avoids touching me, the way the military is following us; the way we have to hide. The way I am even more delicate than before, though at least I can go in water now without my seal washing me away. There is no doubt within me (ha) that I am the Philosopher's Stone now.

But back to the point. Brother reads a lot of books. Right now I think he's reading as much as he can on the Philosopher's Stone. He's read a lot of books on that subject, yet he still does not know how to use it. Me, to use me, for I _am_ it now. I want to understand how to use me too, so I can get Brother's lost limbs back. I'm not sure I want my body back; I'm not sure I would know what to do with it. What will it be like to smell again? To taste food in my mouth? To feel the blows Brother and I exchange on a daily basis to keep ourselves in shape? What will it be like to _be_ in shape again? What will it be like to hear Brother's voice, and see him again?

In the sense of those words- "see" and "hear"- I can do neither. Funny, because I've lost all the senses but how to _sense_ Brother. I cannot see him, not the way I used to. I cannot see how golden his eyes are, or how tall he is. I can sense when he is near me, just as I can sense Mustang, or Winry, or Granny. I know how to sense a stranger too- those are usually the same, though if they are an unfriendly stranger, I can sense their animosity. In a way, it's a lot like having ESP, or what they call the "sixth sense". It is unlike any of the other five senses, and yet it is the most that is like _sense_, not that it makes any. In this same way I never hear anything, but I get a sense of what people are saying and, especially with Brother, Winry, and Teacher, I can even understand the exact words they use. It nearly is like hearing and Brother has never known that I guess at most everyone's words. It is because I understand his words perfectly.

I think, if I got my body back, I would go into sensory overload. Much like a poorly written poem. But at the same time, I am tired of sensing and I want those five senses back, if only to eat Granny Pinako's stew again.

Well, I really do miss Brother too. I would like to hug him again, to see him smile again (something I have not seen since Mother died.)_ I_ would like to smile again. I want to see the sky again and feel the rain falling on me and smell flowers and feel the soft fur of an abandoned cat. I want to feel the warmth of love, the coldness of anger, the moistness of tears. I want to get a cavity from eating too many sweets on my birthday, and I want to feel the pain of the tooth being pulled out. I want to feel the undulation of the earth as it transmutes beneath my hands. I want...

I want to feel Mother's arms hugging me again. I want to cry on her soft shoulder and feel her hand wipe away my tears. I want to smell the freshness of laundry and soap on her hands and I want to hear her whisper in my ears that everything will be all right.

But we failed to bring Mom back, because we did not understand that two drops are not enough to make up a soul. I may not be able to do much, but I know I'm much more than that. I am the impetus of life; I make everything happen. I am beyond sense, beyond tangible things, beyond death itself. When the body decays, the soul lives on.

But the soul is nothing without a body. I am both nothing and everything at the exact same moment; how is that? I think it is an all or nothing deal; the body is nothing without a soul, and the soul is nothing without a body; you need both, or else there is neither. There is no half-and-half, and yet, that is exactly what I am. Stuck in the middle, neither one nor the other. I have a corporeal thing to which I am attached; I have something to move. But this suit of armor is not who I am and it was never meant to be moved by a soul alone. Even this suit is incomplete, for just as I am to my body, so my body is to the armor, like a soul within a soul. We- this suit of armor and I- we skipped an essential step, the step that says I have to be in a body and then I can be put in this armor. The suit was not made to protect a soul alone, but something fleshy and soft and vulnerable; something which I desperately lack.

But the point, the point of this: Brother reads a lot. I said that already, didn't I? I'm sorry; I ramble. If you're wondering, yes this is what I do at night, besides sense the difference between a waking Brother and a sleeping one; the latter is so relaxed, I almost think I can hear his muscles un-tense from beneath the weight of the day. Of course, that's just me going crazy. Anyway, I don't read. In a way, I can't. Well, I _can_, only in the same way I "see" and "hear" and "speak." Oh, yeah, I can't speak either, because I have no vocal chords. It is more of a projection of my thoughts; no sound waves are created. I merely touch on everyone else's sixth sense to convey my message. Usually they translate it into words, because that is how adults and most older kids think. But when I "talk" to someone like Elycia, I usually convey my message in pictures, because babies and young children are much more visual than auditory. Elycia probably understands her sixth sense better than anyone else, because they have convinced themselves that they can actually _hear_ me. But that is just their imagination filling in the sounds they feel they ought to hear.

So that is how I read. I sense the words of the book, just as I sense the words of a person. When a book lies nearby, I can sense its presence, and I can tell what kind of book it is. Some are friendly books, but most are dark, a lot like strangers. The friendly books are usually filled with hope and happiness and nice, easy solutions. The darker ones, the "un-friendly" ones, are sad, depressed, and offer no hope, no solution, easy, difficult, or otherwise. Sometimes they do, but it's rare. It's an adventure though, whatever the book feels like, to try and grasp the concepts of words I cannot see. I could be making most of it up, though I'm pretty sure I'm not. Brother usually verifies whatever I read, though he does not realize it. I don't want to make him worry about me. I'm afraid, too, that were he to find out, he'd read the books to me (and since I know his every word, it would work, too.) But this divination, to find the book's meaning on my own, is a challenge for me, and every time I overcome the book's hidden words, I feel that, even if just by a little, I have conquered all that this existence has taken away from me. I may not be able to eat or to smell or to feel, but I can "hear" and I can "see" and I can "speak", and so I dictate the world around me. It's a good feeling.

Now Brother, I know, has something of the same dilemma. He wants to be in control too, but as a "dog of the military" and on account of his height, he always feels as though he is not in control. I know how he feels, because I can sense his frustration, which so often mirrors my own. Brother always needed to be free; he never likes being tied down and, above all, he does not deal well with things that simply _cannot_ be explained. To Brother, there is no such thing.

Like God, for example. If there were such a being, why has he created this world? To what purpose? And if what the Bible says is true, how do you explain science? According to science, everything falls into place and, on top of that, _you can prove it._ Brother cannot understand blind faith.

Which is why it was weird, that one time on the train as we went out to Dublith with Winry. Winry was sleeping on the bench opposite us and Brother and I shared the other seat. The car was empty otherwise. Brother was looking out the window, watching the sun getting ready to set. Bored, I went through Brother's bag to find a book to read- lack of light is never a problem for me- and pulled out a book which felt neither friendly nor dark, but as though it was waiting for _me_ to decide which it was. Intrigued, I tried to sense the book's name, and the thought "_Bible_" floated across my "mind" (I am still unsure whether or not that is the proper term. "Mind." It's possible). I turned towards Brother, whose presence hovered on the edge of my senses, brooding, thoughtful, and calmed.

"Brother," I thought, willing the words over to him. It was a nudging thought, so as to contain the though within each other and not wake Winry needlessly. "Brother, what is this book?"

I sensed him turn to me, and a memory of Brother's eight-year-old face, laughably serious, came to mind. "Al? ...That's a Bible, silly. Haven't you seen a Bible before?"

To be honest, I had never "seen" a Bible before, but I had certainly sensed them. Every hotel we stayed at over the years had one, and I realized that all of them had the same ponderous, patient quality to them, as though waiting for me to define them. "Yes, Brother, I've seen Bibles before. But why do you have one?" I asked.

"I..." his words faltered and I wondered if he meant for me not to find this book. Was he afraid that I would think him weak, that he had succumbed to curiosity, crossed the line between disdain and his thirst for knowledge? Did he fear that I would scorn him? I don't know, but that's what I suspect caused him to hesitate. But Brother cannot keep too many secrets from me (other than that burning question he really was too scared to ask me, has he ever _not_ told me anything?) and so he continued. "I wanted to read it, that's all."

"Why?" The picture that comes to mind when I ask simple questions like that is a cat, tilting its head to the side, whiskers alert and ears erect, like twin pyramids rising from the sand of its dark head, above suns of predatory curiosity. Strange, I know; Brother says I obsess over the animals. I do.

I sensed him shrug, a heavy shrug, as though he carried the world on those shoulders. "Because, I felt like it. I just want to read it, find out what it's all about."

"What's what all about?"

He scowled, I think. He was annoyed. "Religion, Al, why people believe in it. Where such blind devotion comes from. They had a nice copy at the hospital, so I took it."

"Brother," I admonished him. "That's stealing, you know."

"I borrowed it. And besides, if it saves my soul, then I'll have compensated for that minor sin."

He was being cocky, which is like him when he wants to hide something. Or when he's talking to the Colonel, but if he uses that tone with me, it means he is trying to pull the wool over my eyes. Problem for him is, I don't have any. "That's just an excuse, Brother."

"What, the 'save my soul' part? I was only kidding-"

"No, Brother," I thought. It is easy to interrupt someone when you invade their very mind. "Why do you really want to read this book?"

"But Al, I told you-"

"It's just an excuse. What aren't you telling me, Brother?"

He took the book from me; I could sense that brooding presence on the edge of Brother's, as though he were holding it to his chest, as one might hold a baby, or a kitten. "I wanted to see what the Bible says about...sin. I wanted to know if merely thinking something counts, or if a sin is only the action, not the thought."

"Brother? I don't understand."

I sensed his braid cut through the air. I wondered what his braid looked like, flying about like that. I wondered what Brother's hair looks like, being so long. "I also wanted to know what happens to a sinner when he dies. I want to know where I'll go..." his words came to a stop.

"What did you find out, Brother?"

"Ha!" The laugh cut through me like the blade of his transmutable arm. "I haven't read it yet, actually, so I don't know. I wonder, though, what I'll find."

Then I sensed a great sadness and regret crash upon Brother like a tidal wave. I took the book back and stuck it in the bag again. "Whatever it says, Brother, you have to know that none of it's true. It is just a story that people made up because they needed something to believe in. But you and I, we have alchemy and equivalent exchange. We don't need their Bible to understand the world, Brother."

Brother nodded; I could sense his bangs flap up and down like wings. His bangs I know. "But Al, what if it's good, what the book says? What if...I want to believe it?"

I could feel my helmet's eyes staring like real eyes at Brother for saying something so devoid of hope, of life, that I nearly took the book out and flung it out the window. I guess I just did not like the idea that Brother was changing and I did not even get to see him change. Or that Brother would be so hopeless to want to find hope in something he could never truly believe in. Whatever it was, though, that made him so sad, I never found out. Winry woke then and later, I found the Bible was missing. Brother never brought it up again and I never thought to ask what it was he found in their, if anything. It's possible he never even read it, but burned it, or threw it away before it had the chance to make him doubt. I don't think I'll ever ask. Because that sadness I sensed in Brother is the same I sense in myself, the same pain, the same grief. And I'm afraid to hear what Brother might say if I asked, what he might reveal about sin, about what will happen to me when I die.

I'm selfish. I'm tired of living like this. I want my body back, even if the shock kills me, just to imagine that I can hug Brother again, cry on his shoulders, breathe in his metallic and (I imagine) earthy scent, run my fingers through his long (and likely tangled) hair, and hear him whisper that everything will be all right. Because I know I can't expect that from Mom. And if I die when I open my eyes, take my first breath, my first bite, or when my fingertips brush along my restored skin, if I die and not know where I'll go with the rest of the sinners, it'll be okay because I'll go believing that there is no such place.

And even if there is, even if there is such a place, at least I'll be able to discover it on my own.

Because if there is such a place, it's waiting for me, and when I die, that's where I'll go. For I...

_End_

Oh, I'm liking that ending. I know how I'd like it to end, but there could, I hope, be more than one way to finish that thought. Of course, that's the point (at least, I think it is.) Well, on another note, I wrote this in first person! Didn't mean to, but that's how it turned out. I'm actually happy to have written this, merely because I was able to present my theories on Alphonse's existence. I mean, it never sat with me too well that Al could speak, considering he has nothing to speak with. Does that bother no one else? Well, this is my explanation for that, anyway. So, I hope to get nice, lengthy reviews for this story, because I put thought into this! I saw in another author's comments at the conclusion a very convincing argument for thought-out reviews: she put in the time to write the story, so the reviewer should at least put a little bit of time in writing the review. Equivalent exchange, she said it was. I give you some of my time, now you give me some of yours. Fair, no? Well, until the next one-shot- Rowan


End file.
